Past Imperfect

A seasoned fisherman of hardy Norwegian stock, Nels Bertelsen is found dead on his boat, apparently from a bee sting to which he was highly allergic. No one questions the tragic randomness of this accident except John McIntire, a retired military intelligence officer and now the new constable of St. Adele, Michigan, the hometown to which he has returned after thirty years abroad.

McIntire suspects that someone actually places the bees in the victim's clothing and replaced his vial of antidote with poison. Bertelsen was a hot-tempered man -- but had he picked one fight too many? As McIntire probes deeper into the victims life, a teenage girl is found strangled to death but her body disappears before McIntire arrives on the scene. The no-nonsense soldier gets busy reacquainting himself with Michigan's Upper Peninsula as well as the folks he grew up with . . . and discovers some buried secrets worth killing for.

John looks forward to some serenity, but almost immediately he investigates a homicide that he quickly solves. A year later, fisherman Nels Bertelsen is found dead aboard his boat, the victim of a bee bite. At first it appears to be a tragic accident, but John uncovers evidence that leads him to conclude that someone placed the bee in the victim's clothing while the medicine that would have saved Nels was replaced by something useless. The only problem is nobody had a motive to murder the man.

PAST IMPERFECT is a very well written regional mystery starring an enigmatic hero who is readjusting to life in the USA. The supporting cast is colorful and eccentric while the plot is fast-paced and exciting. Katherine Hills makes the 1950's in the peninsula of Northern Michigan seem real in the mind's eye of the reader, who along with reviewer, looks forward to more works starring the True Grit like character of John McIntire.

Harriet Klausner